Leading People to Reject Status Quo, Generate Bold Ideas, & Achieve Big Goals

What a feeling it was to walk out on stage with 370+ next-gen business leaders gathered in one room, ready to guide the city of Detroit, MI, and beyond, into its next chapter.

At the end of September, I had the honor of giving the opening keynote to a sold-out crowd at the Detroit Economic Club Young Leader Conference. It was special because, although Detroit isn't my hometown, it became home once I moved there just shy of 30 years ago. Along with the city itself, the future of Detroit's business leaders is bright.

Photo by Jeff Kowalsky

My message to the group that morning was simple, and it applies to every generation of leaders. As Marshall Goldsmith said:

"What got you here won't get you there."

If we want our organizations to remain relevant and sustainable, we need to do three critical things as leaders:

1. Encourage and empower people to reject status quo

2. Enable people to generate bold ideas

3. Be able to gain buy-in to our ideas and initiatives

Today, I want to share the message and simple framework for innovation I shared with the group that morning, so that you can inspire your people to generate bold ideas, drive transformation, and achieve differentiated results.

Overcoming human nature

A few months ago, someone said something to me that I thought was absolutely brilliant:

"Alan, human nature is undefeated."

The moment I heard it, I loved it.

Think about human nature... we're naturally drawn to the familiar—things that make us feel comfortable and safe. We want to avoid risk and not expose ourselves to potential threats.

Well, when those mindsets are applied to business, it leads to complacency.

So we end up with organizations that prioritize being comfortable and operating in familiar ways vs organizations that are progressive, push boundaries, and take risks.

Which type of company would you bet on to thrive in the future: The one that believes and accepts that "good enough is good enough" or the one that is constantly re-inventing itself?

I'll bet on the latter...

So your mission as a leader is to challenge people to think differently.

From my experience, that requires consistent effort to shift people's perspective.

Things like:

• Challenging traditional thinking.

• Asking people to explain why the current solution is the best.

• Using examples of companies that have successfully re-invented themselves.

• Poking holes in the status quo.

• Inviting people into a new strategy and narrative.

As a leader, you set the tone. And whether you're leading an entire company, a practice, or even a small team, you dictate which mindsets are acceptable and which ones won't be tolerated.

Choose wisely...

Photo by Jeff Kowalsky

A tactical framework for innovation

Innovation is a result, not an action. You won't sit down one day, decide to "innovate" and magically come up with creative solutions to age-old problems.

From my experience, innovation is a result (output) of intentional inputs.

1. Embrace the Art of the Possible

Coming up in the accounting profession, there was an often-used phrase that I grew to loathe hearing... SALY. If that's your name, it's really nothing personal, and I'm sure you're a lovely person.

SALY stands for "same as last year". That's the mindset in many firms. "Well, last year's efforts seemed to work fine enough, so let's do the same thing as last year, and that will be our strategy."

It's a losing mindset. Because while you make friends with SALY, there are plenty of other firms out there who are re-inventing themselves. So while you may think that SALY means you are maintaining, you are actually falling behind.

Your job, as a leader, is to start by helping your team see what could be vs. what is. People can’t think boldly if they’re trapped inside the limits of what already exists. So, your first job is to expand their field of vision.

That might mean showing examples from outside your industry, encouraging “what if” conversations, or asking, “If there were no limits, what would we do?”

That's the Art of the Possible.

Before we can start acting differently, we have to start thinking differently.

2. Build it from scratch

When it's time to start reimagining the future, people will default to being limited by circumstances, roadblocks, and hurdles that already exist—there's that human nature thing again.

One of the most effective exercises I've found is called whiteboarding. Rather than starting to re-imagine things based on the way things already are, start from scratch.

At Baker Tilly, some of our most successful strategic initiatives began with the question, “If we were building a firm from scratch starting today, how would we do it?”

That mindset frees people from the legacy systems, politics, and inertia that hold most firms back. If we embrace the mindset that the way things are might not be the ideal way they should be, building from scratch allows us to come up with bold ideas and innovative solutions.

3. Ask "What will it take?"

Here’s where the rubber meets the road.

Bold ideas are inspiring, but they’re meaningless unless they're executed. This is where leaders must balance inspiration with intentionality. Most whiteboarding sessions end with people realizing there are too many barriers to the ideal solution.

Your job is to change the question.

You shouldn't ask people, "Do you think we can do this?" The answer will inevitably be no.

You should ask people, "What will it take to accomplish this?"

Notice the difference?

WWIT doesn't allow a yes-or-no answer. It forces us to come up with a solution. That solution could seem completely outlandish, but it's a possible path.

What I've found more times than not is that the solutions we'll come up with aren't as out of reach as they might seem. When your people go through a WWIT exercise, you, as the leader, are now able to make an educated decision based on the path presented.

This is where ideas move from abstract to actionable, and where true innovation begins to take shape.

4. Recognize and overcome objectors

Every bold idea will meet resistance. This reality has proven itself true again and again in my leadership journey. In fact, I dedicated a whole chapter to this in my book, Break the Mold™, because of how prevalent objectors are and how critical overcoming objections is.

Some people resist because they fear change. Others because they don’t understand it. And some because they’re simply invested in the way things are.

Your role as a leader is to anticipate objections, understand where they’re coming from, and engage with them directly. Bring objectors into the process. Ask for their input. Show them how their perspective can strengthen the idea rather than weaken it.

Some objectors can be won over through appealing to their emotions. For example, I was able to move a critical leader at Baker Tilly into a new role that supported our strategy by guaranteeing their comp for a couple of years.

Other objectors are tougher. They have to be won over through direct conversation and sometimes direct confrontation. They are more ingrained and invested in keeping things the way they are. Buckle up, because those types of objectors are a challenge. With them, you need to stay committed to your strategy and not give in.

Ultimately, a mentor, Stephen Chipman, once said: "If you can't change the people, change the people." Sometimes, counseling people out of the organization is what's best for both parties.

Photo by Jeff Kowalsky

The bottom line

The future belongs to those who are willing to Break the Mold™.

Your job, as a leader, is to be the one who facilitates the necessary mindset shifts and creates the pathways to enable people to reject status quo, generate bold ideas, and achieve differentiated outcomes.

Doing so requires 4 things:

1. Embrace the Art of the Possible

2. Build it from scratch

3. Ask "What will it take?"

4. Recognize and overcome objectors

I hope this framework acts as a guide for you as it has for me over my years of leadership. I can tell you from experience that if you commit to following it, you'll be amazed at what your team and organization will be able to achieve.

I write more about these principles and share real-life stories from my experiences at Baker Tilly and my advisory clients in my upcoming book, Break the Mold. I'm putting the finishing touches on it now, and it will be available to order in the next couple of weeks.

Stay tuned to my LinkedIn, newsletters, and website for more updates.

With intention,
Alan D Whitman